Say what you will about Rish . . . it can't be worse than what he says about himself.

"I hope it's gonna make you notice,
I hope it's gonna make you notice . . .
Someone like me."
Kings of Leon

"I don't think anyone knows what they really think--or perhaps even what they really know--until it's written down."
Stephen King

Monday, March 05, 2007

Podcast Good! (a pun so bad, you win a dollar if you get it)

I'm way into podcasts right now. If you're at all like me (and frankly, if you are, make sure you buy a gun whose barrel fits in your mouth), and are a little slow at adopting new technologies, a podcast is an audio recording made available for download (usually as an mp3) on the internet. You can download them to listen on your computer, can save them onto an mp3 player to listen while jogging or burglaring, or you can even burn them onto a CD to listen in the car. They're usually just recordings of people talking about subjects of interest, and in the past year, I've seen thousands of them spring up all over the internet, in the way that thousands of message boards sprung up in the late Nineties. Some are pretty great, some quite professionally produced, and some are literally unlistenable.

I mightily enjoy them here at work (I've even tried to get tyranist to collaborate on a podcast for the Horror Film Compendium), and thought I'd mention it in my blog.* A couple of podcasts I have become a regular listener of include:

BSG Episode PodcastsRonald D. Moore, writer and executive producer of the new "Battlestar Galactica," tells all. Every week, he describes how and where things were shot, deleted and discarded scenes, and the creation of storylines, characters, motivations, and plotlines throughout the show. It's totally fascinating, if you're a huge Ron Moore fan like I am.

Make It SoA couple of British blokes talking about Star Trek. They are really funny, pretty passionate, and those accents make everything more palatable anyway.

Spider-man Crawlspace PodcastA group of guys from around the U.S. (including a Southerner who seems physically incapable of pronouncing people's names right), talking about your friendly neighborhood Spider-man, both the comics and the movies. They disagree often, which can be entertaining, but mostly it's just great to hear anybody who knows what they're tlaking about rave about Spidey.

Firefly TalkA much more professionally done podcast, with standard features like News, a Question of the Week, Message Board coverage, Fan Fiction review, and an essay about "Firefly" and SERENITY.

SmodcastWhich is just Kevin Smith (the director) and his friend Scott Mosier (the producer of Smith's films) talking about whatever they feel like talking about, with Kevin never failing to say something revoltingly offensive practically every five minutes.

Being James BondWhere a couple of dudes, one super into James Bond novels, and one just into the films, talk about Bond-related subjects, such as how to play cards, race cars, ski, fly planes, shoot guns, and how to shag awesome international babes. Oh, and they talk about the Bond series too.

Tales of HorrorWhere they play old Suspense and Horror-related radio dramas, ranging from the Forties to the Nineties. The quality is all over the place on these, but every once in a while, there's a great one, and even when they're bad, radio dramas are nice nostalgic glimpses at the past that gets farther away with each passing day.

I've listened to many other podcasts, whose subjects MAY range from Harry Potter, the ViewAskewniverse, people picking scabs, downloaded radio shows, drunken European "Firefly" ruminations, tales of people from New Hampshire, tales of people who have been to New Hampshire, tales of people who know people who have been to New Hampshire, horror films, something called vagina dentata, movie review shows, singing serial killer call-in programmes, urethras, interview shows, in-depth critical discussion about the works of Right Said Fred, advice columns, shows on the paranormal, shows about fat people and those who wish they were fat but aren't, Stephen King book reviews, a weekly radio hour about DARBY O'GILL AND THE LITTLE PEOPLE, fanmade erotica involving Ronald McDonald and Grimace, fanmade erotica involving the Fry Guys, cat lover digest, cat lover digest (safe sex version), celebrity urethras, NPR, homemade Indiana Jones, James Bond, and Star Trek adventures, dwarf, scat, and spider fetish discussion groups, and comic book news podcasts.

More on that tomorrow.

Rish "Easy Listening" Outfield

*Though now that I've typed this, I don't know why I thought it was a good idea.

About Me

Not much can be said about Mr. Outfield that hasn't been said by the average parent to scare their children into behaving, into going to sleep, or keeping their mouths shut about what they saw take place in the woodshed.